Wild Shrew Literary Review (WSLR) is Sinister Wisdom’s online book review project. To complement the longer list of suggested books available for review, each month we feature a selection of books being released that month. If you would like to write a review, or if you would like to be added to the WSLR email list to receive the monthly complete book list with book descriptions, please email the WSLR editor, Chloe Berger, at chloe at sinisterwisdom dot org.


August 2026 Featured Books:
1. The Divine Gardener’s Handbook: Or What To Do If Your Girlfriend Accidentally Turns Off the Sun by Eli Snow
2. First Summer by Ekin Oklap
3. All We Hide by Robyn Gigl
4. The Lost Brontë by Catherine Friend
5. Appetite by P. Paramita
6. Reproductive Justice, Queerly by Carly Thomsen
7. Books, Iced Coffee & a Side of Dragons by Amanda Lovelace
8. Unsafe: The Carceral Roots of the Anti-Trans Backlash by Sarah Lamble
9. The Bayou Keeps the Bones by Bailey Bridgewater
10. A Spring of Resilient Light by Karen Poppy


Book descriptions:

The Divine Gardener’s Handbook: Or What To Do If Your Girlfriend Accidentally Turns Off the Sun by Eli Snow: Perfect for fans of Tamsyn Muir and Rebecca Thorne, this joyful debut follows a gardener fighting to secure her dream job in the Divine Gardens—manipulating God, antagonizing her attractive rival, and running afoul of a brewing rebellion along the way.

Cyprin grows perfect apples.

No other worker tends the orchards like she can. Sick of living in a Jenga-esque megacity where she’s never alone (there’s always a rat), Cyprin dreams of a job in the Divine Gardens, tending to the plants overseen by God.

Her only way in is winning an annual flower pageant—one that’s been dominated by the Divine Gardens’ head gardener for five years running: an insufferable woman with an undeniable affinity for plants. When Cyprin plays dirty (criminally dirty) and wins, she jumps headfirst into life in the gardens and her rivalry with the head gardener, who she just can’t stop thinking about.

Pranks, backstabbing, and a lot of heated glaring unite them, until they’re both drawn into a plot to take down God—who’s really just some guy with a great garden. As they spiral through layers of the city’s history and underground rebel group, Cyprin and her rival will find they understand each other like no one else does, even if there can only be one head gardener in the end.

But rise or fall, at least Cyprin will always have the rats.

A chaotically queer exploration of love, ambition, and toxic work culture, The Divine Gardener’s Handbook is a romp of a science fantasy that will leave you gasping for more.

First Summer by Ekin Oklap: A dreamy debut novel about the summer love that changes two girls at the edge of adulthood.

“In the heat and the green haze that seemed to surround us both like a physical presence, I felt intensely awake.”

One afternoon at the start of summer, a teenage girl watches a new girl move in across the street. In Clara, she recognizes the same loneliness that she feels herself, but finds tenderness and laughter, too. Over hot, languid days spent talking and reading side by side in the garden, the narrator is awakened to the possibility of a true connection with another human being, free of the self-consciousness she feels with others.

Meanwhile, in a distant fictional galaxy, Nadia the space explorer—the protagonist of a childhood book series beloved by both girls—traverses the known universe with her companion Rosa. Their imagined adventures make sense of new and powerful feelings.

First Summer captures the innocence and agony of adolescence and the exquisite promise of love on the cusp of adulthood: a moment where fantasy is still vivid in the mind, even as adulthood looms. This story of the first summer of love echoes throughout the characters’ lives and will change them forever.

All We Hide by Robyn Gigl: A trans detective working for the District Attorney’s Office takes on the twisty, poignant cold case murder of a local trans woman—and her investigation unravels the threads of a county-wide conspiracy as well as a personal mystery that’s haunted her since childhood.

When Lieutenant Lauren Kelly is exiled to the Homicide Cold Case Unit at the DA’s office, she knows her superiors are sticking her there as punishment until she can quietly retire. That way, no one can claim they discriminated against the only trans detective in Donn County.

Even though Lauren has enough on her plate already—a teenage daughter struggling with Lauren’s transition, an ex-wife Lauren hasn’t gotten over, a former detective father with Alzheimer’s—she starts looking into the murder of Sherry Darling, a trans sex worker and Lauren’s former high school classmate. As Lauren looks deeper into Sherry’s case, she finds evidence of a cover-up with far-reaching implications that may or may not be tied to the reason her mother left.

The Lost Brontë by Catherine Friend: A spellbinding tale of hidden desires, whispered secrets, and a darkness that lingers behind every locked door.

Yorkshire, 1898.

When twenty—one—year—old Lilianne Loxley is sent to Lord Bexton’s isolated estate to work off her uncle’s debts, she expects drudgery—not danger. With her gift for mimicry, she becomes Bexton’s secretary—and his reluctant forger. Soon she’s trapped in a scheme to create a “lost” novel by Emily Brontë, a deception that could make—or destroy—fortunes.

The house is full of secrets: footsteps echo in empty corridors, lemon—scented ghosts haunt her sleepless nights, and a portrait seems to watch her every move. Yet it’s the living who unsettle her most—especially Wren McAllister, the sharp—tongued maid whose defiance hides a tender heart. Drawn together by loss and longing, Lily and Wren risk everything for a freedom neither has ever known.

As the line between truth and invention blurs, Lily uncovers a shocking connection to the Brontë family—and to Bexton himself—that will force her to choose between love, loyalty, and the dangerous power of her own pen.

Catherine Friend’s The Lost Brontë is an atmospheric gothic romantic mystery steeped in secrets, desire, and literary intrigue.

Appetite by P. Paramita: A propulsive and utterly original debut about a young chef’s ambitions—and the pro wrestler she idolizes who derails everything

Zarina, a prep cook at a fancy New Haven restaurant, is underpaid, overworked, and might as well be invisible. The only they get to take home leftover ingredients. Every night, Zarina whips up modern spins on the Bangladeshi dishes she grew up eating, all while enjoying her second greatest professional wrestling. Namely, Zarina’s hero Sierra Myst—the massively successful, high-flying heel who’s built like a superhero and is every bit as confident and daring as one.

One night, Zarina posts online about one of Sierra Myst’s wins, and the most improbable thing Sierra reaches out to Zarina. She's elated at the chance to become closer with her idol, and at first, their friendship is everything Zarina’s ever dreamed of. Zarina’s confidence grows, their world gets bigger, and opening their own restaurant doesn’t feel quite so impossible. But as the weeks fly by, Zarina starts to feel more like Sierra’s unpaid personal assistant and relationship counselor—and her desire to make Sierra happy eclipses their own goals and threatens everything they’ve worked for.

Deliciously propulsive and ultimately uplifting, Appetite is about the unique torture of being a twenty-something who’s torn between the person someone else wants you to be and the person you really are.

Reproductive Justice, Queerly by Carly Thomsen: An invitation into doing reproductive justice queerly.

Queer theory and reproductive justice need each other—now more than ever. As liberals and leftists increasingly frame reproductive justice in terms of LGBTQ+ rights, often adopting the language of “queerness,” it has become difficult to see that their political demands and strategies are often quite conservative. In Reproductive Justice, Queerly, Carly Thomsen examines typical reproductive justice issues—including abortion, surrogacy, crisis pregnancy centers, paid parental leave, and parenting—in queer ways. She shows what can happen when we bring queer theory and reproductive justice together: a queerer, more powerful articulation of what we are fighting for.

Books, Iced Coffee & a Side of Dragons by Amanda Lovelace: A struggling bookstore, a budding new romance, and a mischievous coven of dragons, what could possibly go wrong? Find out in this sugary sweet debut graphic novel from USA Today bestselling author and your favorite cozy witch, Amanda Lovelace!

Welcome to Sea Witch Cove!

Lucinda (call her Luci!) is the owner of Little Lighthouse Books, an adorable bookstore in a defunct lighthouse in her small Jersey Shore town. Everything in her life would be perfect if only Aster, the trans woman who runs the coffee shop next door, would notice her. But with a little bit of luck—and the help of Dandelion, the tiny, curious wind dragon that Aster helps her rescue—this might be the summer that Aster and Luci finally find love.

Amanda Lovelace’s debut graphic novel—brought to shimmering life by illustrator Raquel Trave—Books, Iced Coffee & a Side of Dragons is the perfect time capsule of sapphic summertime sweetness.

Unsafe: The Carceral Roots of the Anti-Trans Backlash by Sarah Lamble: The fiercest battles over gender today aren’t just about identity or womanhood―but about punishment, fear, and control.
The twenty-first century “gender wars” have been driven by a powerful and seductive narrative: that safety can be secured through exclusion, surveillance, and the policing of difference. These punitive logics have gained momentum across the political spectrum, fueling an anti-trans backlash and distorting the meaning of safety itself.

Unsafe is a clear-eyed and decisive challenge to the toxic ideas at the heart of this backlash. With patient rigour, Lamble exposes how carceral approaches to safety fail to address root causes of harm, ultimately deepening social divisions and legitimising new forms of violence and control.

Drawing on feminist and queer traditions as well as their experience organizing against prisons and policing, Lamble makes a principled case for a different vision: one where safety is not built on punishment but on collective care, radical solidarity, and transformative justice.

The Bayou Keeps the Bones by Bailey Bridgewater: How far will you go for someone who was never yours?

When a distraught woman bursts into a Louisiana diner, truck driver Cass Blaney doesn’t think twice about offering her a ride out of town. Florence is running from an abusive husband, and Cass is compelled to help.

But is Florence really who she claims to be? As Cass brings her along on long hauls across the South, robberies and bodies seem to be pursuing them along the hot asphalt. Cass wants to believe in coincidences, but Florence’s secrets are impossible to ignore.

Drawn in by her growing love for Florence, Cass crosses line after line to protect her. And soon they’re burying a body together.

In the sweltering heat of the swamp, trust turns to obsession and love becomes a weapon. Does Florence love Cass too, or is she setting her up to take the fall?

A Spring of Resilient Light by Karen Poppy: In her bold second collection, A Spring of Resilient Light, Karen Poppy crafts poems that speak from the body, the land, and the unseen. Her voice—part oracle, part survivor—confronts cycles of harm and violence, from personal violation to inherited wounds, and the healing that follows. These poems embrace rupture as a path to transformation. Poppy interrogates the boundaries between destruction and beauty, guiding readers through ash and regrowth toward a fragile, defiant wholeness shaped by endurance, truth-telling, and deep ecological connection.